Teen Times/Ruth Gilligan: Your eyes meet across a crowded room. He smiles, you smile, you can feel your knees go weak and your heart rise up inside your chest.

The clock has started. According to psychological research, you now have just four minutes to convince this person that you are attractive.

Four minutes, and then it's too late. There's no time to delve into your life history, or list off all your interests and aspirations, there's no time at all really. Four minutes.

It's not shallow, it's not superficial; it's human nature, and it's not fair.

So supposing by some miracle you do get talking to them, your mind racing for witty and clever things to say. Don't bother. A mere 7 per cent of what we're actually saying is having an effect on the listener - our body language and tone of voice are really doing the talking. A whole conversation and expression of emotions and thoughts can be taking place without a single word being uttered.

Subtlety is not something that is inherently associated with flirting. Even when we think we're playing it cool, if anyone bothered to stop and take a look at the signs, we may as well be holding up a neon sign saying "I FANCY YOU!"

Whether it's in Club Bondi on a Friday night or in the local corner shop after school, our bodies give away exactly what we're thinking. These days teenage men - or in fact boys - inadvertently think back to prehistoric man, the hunter-gatherer. He roamed the forest, looking for beasts to kill and bring home to his woman. He was broad and strong and oozed testosterone.

Is it any surprise, then, that the adolescent male seems obsessed with swaggering along, shoulders flexed and chest puffed out, defying anyone who dares to say he is not in fact the alpha male. When he sits down, nursing a pint - or indeed a pretty girl - his legs are always

spread wide, to draw attention to his genital area, all the time showing who's boss.

Girls, too, make sure to draw attention to the appropriate areas, by wiggling their hips and shaking their bums as they walk. Low-cut tops are also an obvious ally when playing this game. Females also look back to their ancestors as they try to prove they are curvy, child-bearing women who would be the perfect mate for the hunter-gatherer of their choice.

Pupils dilate when someone is attracted to someone else, hence the teenage girl's obsession with eyeliner and mascara, desperate to make them look more sultry and alluring (pity it smudges so much when they're out dancing though; men aren't keen on panda eyes).

When we are lusting after that special somebody, our limbs subconsciously point towards them, we mirror their actions and traits, our eyebrows rise momentarily and we tilt our heads, not to mention our constant quest to make eye contact as much as possible. It's all done involuntarily, but to be honest, could we be any more blatant? Oh, to be able to go into the hottest club in town on a Saturday night and press the mute button on the scene before you.

No loud, thumping music or cheesy chat-up lines, just a sea of physical conversations and desires, ready for analysis. There is an old proverb that advises to "talk less, say more". So rather than wasting our time, blabbering on in a vague attempt to secure our hearts' desire, we should shut up and think about what our bodies are saying.

Let it do the talking, let it win them over, but hurry - those vital four minutes are ticking away.

Ruth Gilligan (17) is a pupil at St Andrew's College, Dublin

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